


Off the Deep End

by scythelyfe



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: Eventual Threesome, F/M, I Blame Tumblr, I Don't Even Know, M/M, Multi, OT3, Post Series, Punk!Percy (sort of...later...maybe)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-11-11
Updated: 2015-07-08
Packaged: 2018-01-01 04:54:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1040573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scythelyfe/pseuds/scythelyfe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Annabeth didn’t like the way Nico looked at Percy. </p><p>So what does she do?  She all but forces him to go on a quest with her while Percy is still in summer school, and somehow manages to inadvertently invite him into a permanent kind of threesome with her and her boyfriend. Meanwhile, monsters have stopped attacking Percy at every possible opportunity and started running away from him for some reason.</p><p>Their lives are weird.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Percy Jackson Fan Club Can Only Have One President

**Author's Note:**

> Apologies for any butchering of Greek culture. Anything I learned about mythological artifacts comes from Wikipedia. This is for NaNoWriMo and therefore I have not had time to edit it much (at all) and so any mistakes will be corrected when someone points them out or the next time I go over this.

Annabeth doesn’t like the way Nico looked at Percy.  

Of course she noticed it.  About ninety percent of the demigods she’d ever met had looked at Percy with the same combination of awe, hero-worship, and attraction.  (It was actually _really_ annoying.  Why couldn’t he have turned out unattractive and _not_ the type of person who’d sacrifice his life for someone he’d never met?)

Annabeth also knows that there's more to Nico’s glares and sidelong glances of longing than the average groupie.  She likes to think she has enough self-awareness to recognize the expression that crosses her own face whenever Seaweed Brain does something particularly adorkable, heroic or otherwise.  Actually, everything he does just kind of makes her feel like she's riding on top of a rocket going 3000 miles per hour, about to leave the atmosphere and remembering _Oh, I forgot my space suit_.

Knowing that, all she can think is: A) _Poor Nico,_ and B) _Suck it, he’s mine._

(She may be smart, but maturity comes and goes.)

So yes, she gets Nico’s feelings, completely sympathizes even, but she’s kind of in a bind here. Because while she wants the kid to be happy after all he’s been through, she’s not about to give up the greatest thing that ever happened to her.

If Percy ever found out that _he_ was the greatest thing that ever happened to her, she’d never live it down.  Even though she’s pretty sure he might say the same thing about her. (Annabeth is perfectly aware the fact that Percy makes her crazy and irrational and prone to cliches. But she can't really do anything about it, so whatever.)

She’s pretty sure Nico is feeling something similar when he glares at her from across the dining pavilion at Camp Half Blood.  

It’s early summer and there are fireflies on the outskirts of the dining area, kept at bay by the tribunal flames.  Most campers have already finished eating and are congregating at tables outside their cabins.  The sun has set already but the stars aren’t quite out yet.  For once, things are actually... peaceful.

It’s nights like these that Annabeth missed the most when she was stuck down in Tartarus with Percy.  Nights where they weren’t worried about which birthday was going to be their last, or which monster they’d have to fight tomorrow.  She has no doubt she and Percy and their friends will be saving the world until they die.  At this point, it was pretty much given that the Fates were never gonna let her retire to have a normal architecture career and a normal family with two-point-five kids and a dog.

One might think that, after all the pain, and suffering, and do-or-die, backbreaking work that facilitates saving the world, a normal life would be all she wanted.  Except... she doesn’t.

Annabeth has a mind for strategy.  She has talents that would be wasted off a battlefield.  She has a passion for seeing plans come to fruition, and even more than that, for helping people.

She will always love the simple nights; the quiet nights, where it’s just her and her friends enjoying each others’ company.  But she knows she could never stop fighting.  It’s in her blood.

Annabeth is pretty sure Percy doesn’t see it that way.  He wants the normal life, with the picket fence and the 2.5 kids and the dog.  At least, he thinks he does. 

Annabeth doesn’t have the heart to tell him they’ll always be the prophecy kids for some foretold disaster or another.  

Okay, basically: Yes, they’ll always be heroes.  No, they’ll never be normal.  Whether they’ll be able to balance the two to have a life together remains to be seen.  (Annabeth wouldn’t bet against them though- gods know nothing stops them when they try- not even hell itself).

Nico is still glaring at her.

Annabeth is sitting between Grover and Piper.  They’re teasing Rachel about her latest set of erotic paintings(again) ( _Aren't oracles supposed to be celibate?_ ), while she, ( _Let me have my fun, alright_ ) throws leftovers at them (again).  They’re surrounded by the rest of their friends; the Stoll brothers, Jason, Katie, Leo, even Clarisse, all laughing at one of Calypso’s jokes.  (And apparently being stuck on a deserted island for thousands of years gives someone great comedic timing- who knew?)

Frank and Hazel and Reyna visit from Camp Jupiter sporadically.  The last time Annabeth saw her, Hazel had taken her to the side and told her she was still worried about her brother, maybe he hadn’t really recovered from their summer fighting the earth itself?  Annabeth was pretty sure only she and Jason knew the truth, judging by the frankly obvious looks of concern he always shot them whenever Percy and Nico were within twelve feet of each other.  (And Chiron probably knew too, because nothing slipped by the centaur).  She promised Hazel that she would be there for Nico whenever she could.

Okay but here’s the problem: “Hi Nico, I just want to tell you that it’s okay if you’re in love with my boy friend, even though you come from a time period where being gay was really dangerous and you probably haven’t caught up all that much with current events.  But hey, at least you’re alive, even though most of your family is dead and you can’t be with Percy because, oops, I’m dating him already.”  Yeah.  That’d go over well.  Annabeth was probably the worst person possible to talk to Nico about his issues.  And boy, did the kid have issues.

She wonders what she would do if Percy were here.  No matter what her relationship with Seaweed Brain was, she couldn’t give up Nico’s secret like that, so having Percy confront the perpetually sulking demigod would be impossible.  The two time savior of Olympus (but gods curse her if she ever let it go to his head) wasn’t even coming back to Camp until early August, on account of the fact that he’d missed a significant portion of the school year and was taking summer school courses to avoid having to repeat the next one too.  

So pushing her problems on Seaweed Brain wasn’t an option.  Annabeth happened to glance up once again and accidentally made eye contact with Nico.

Well.  Awkward.

He jerked his head towards the cabins and got up.  Annabeth made excuses and left the table to follow him, citing wanting to finalize chariot designs for her younger siblings to Grover’s questioning glance.  As she walked away she briefly pondered the knowing look and smirk Rachel had directed at her.  

The ginger was getting weirder and weirder every day.  And she hadn’t exactly been the most ordinary person before she’d met Percy and hit Kronos with her hairbrush.

Annabeth tucked that little puzzle into her memory before a clammy hand caught her by the wrist and yanked her into the shadows behind the Hephaestus cabin.

Latching onto it with her other hand, she pivoted and crouched down, throwing her center of gravity at the ground and flipping her would-be attacker over her shoulder.

“Nico!” she peered into the darkness, “Warn a girl!  I could have severed your spinal chord!”

“Keep it down!” he whispered fiercely, scrambling to his feet and putting his hand over her mouth.  Annabeth resisted the urge to lick it just to be petulant, partially because that’s what Percy would have done, and one of them had to be mature in the relationship.  Also, who knows where fifteen year old boy hands have been?  She was not about to taste it and find out.

“What did you want to talk to me about?” she asked, prying his fingers from her mouth.  She wondered if he knew that she knew.  _Probably not,_ she thought, _if he knew then he would be avoiding me at all costs most likely._

If Annabeth knew one thing about Nico di Angelo it was this: No good would come of him isolating himself even more than he already did.

“I just-” Nico started, but trailed off narrowing his eyes at her.  Annabeth recognized the look.  He was scrutinizing her to see if she’d give up how much she knew.  So he at least suspected, then, that she knew that he was gay.  

This was becoming complicated.  

“I just,” he started again, “was wondering why you were starring at me all dinner...” he finished lamely.  “Nevermind.  I’ll leave you alone."

Ah. No. He was retreating into himself again.  Shit, she had to say something.  But what?

“Come on a quest with me.”  Wait, what?

Nico turned back to face her, his face mirroring her own incredulity at what she had said.

“Come on a quest with me.” she repeated, rolling with it now.  “Chiron located a lost object recently that... would require help from a son of Hades to retrieve.”  Lie.  Shit, where was she going with this?

“Why can’t Hazel do it?” he asked, “And why would you be on the quest if Chiron only needs a child of Hades?”

Valid points.  Ugh, why couldn’t Nico be more gullible like Percy?  (That’s mean- Percy isn’t that gullible in actuality- not when it really matters at least).

“I’m one of the most experienced demigods here,” she began, ignoring the way he raised an eyebrow, as if to say _And I’m **not** experienced?_   

“And Hazel is busy doing Roman quests.  For the Roman gods.  Look, Chiron and I agreed that a quest would be good for you.  And it wouldn’t even take that long.  It’d be over before Percy got here!”  Fuck.  Why had she brought up Percy?  

 _Nice going Annabeth_ , she thought as she watched Nico’s expression twist into something ugly and pinched.

“Why would that matter?” he asked defensively.  (It’s painful how obvious he is sometimes.)  “And why are you and Chiron talking about me behind my back?” He turned to leave again.  Annabeth’s mind went into overdrive trying to think of a way to convince him to join her on a quest.  She wasn’t sure what part of her brain the idea had come from, but she knew instinctively that it would be the key to helping Nico.

Huh, when had she started being so nice to others?  She really was maturing.

“Nico, wait!”  she grabbed his wrist, but he spun, pulling her over his head in the same move she had used on him just minutes ago.  But Annabeth had been training since she was seven years old- she twisted her body mid air and landed on her feet, back slamming into the Hephaestus Cabin.

“Just leave.  Me.  Alone.”  Nico bit out.  He started walking away again.

“No!”  Annabeth recognized this feeling.  It was the same rebellious feeling she got whenever someone told her to do something she didn’t want to do.  She chased Nico through the darkened camp, belatedly realizing he was headed towards his cabin.  

“Nico, look.” he stopped short, and she threw her hand out to stop from running into him.  He flinched away from her touch.  Annabeth withdrew her hand slowly.  _Note to self: no touching._

“I really do need you for this quest.” she said.  How could she convince him to come?  Nico wasn’t particularly charitable, and he especially wasn’t going to be doing her any favors.

“It’s for Percy,” she blurted out. So much for thinking, she had gone with her gut instead.  “I need to get this artifact for Percy because... his birthday is coming up?” she trailed off, wincing internally.  Stupid gut.

Nico’s expression was incredulous.  “You want me... to help you find a birthday present... for your boyfriend?”  His voice and expression reminded her of someone in pain.  

Crap.  Where could she go from there?  “No!  I already have his birthday present!” Not a lie, for once.  “This other present will... help unify and protect the camps.” Yeah, okay, that’d work.  If Nico cared about anyone, it’d be his sister, who was spending most of her time on the other side of the country.  “You can give it to Percy,” she added, like an afterthought.  “Since you probably didn’t get him anything.”  That was mean, but she’d calculated it to sting just enough for him to be motivated to outshine her with Percy’s birthday present.  Judging by his expression, she’d been right.

“Just leave me alone.”  Okay, so maybe not.  He disappeared into his cabin.  The door slammed shut decisively.  

 _Well, that could have gone better._ Annabeth thought, heading back to cabin dejectedly.  She’d really wanted to help Nico this time.  Annabeth felt badly that Bianca had given up her life on a quest to rescue her.  Not to mention, the kid had no positive influences in his life that he didn’t push away.  Maybe he just needed one that would latch on and not let go.

Vowing to find a solution in the morning, Annabeth got ready for bed.


	2. The One Where Annabeth Gets In Nico's Pants... sort of

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Something's up with Percy. Annabeth gets her quest. Rachel knows too much. Poor Nico.

 Percy used to think regular school was boring.  It had nothing on the mind numbing monotony of summer school, where the only sounds were the teacher’s voice droning on and on about proofs and postulates and the whining of the dying air conditioner.  Sweat was running in single droplets down his neck and disappearing behind the collar of his shirt.  

Also: the clock had stopped working.

This was the payment he got for saving the world.  Twice.  Endless boredom and not getting to see his girlfriend or his friends for another three weeks?  Pass.  

The life of a hero was _not_ all its cracked up to be.

He was actually wishing a hydra or something would come crashing through the window, or that the teacher would be some immortal servant of Hades, _hell-bent_ (haha) on sending him to meet her master.  _Permanently._

So naturally, nothing happened until school was already over for the day.  To add insult to injury, he didn’t even get to work through his aggression by killing something.

The telekhine took one look at him, whimpered, and promptly ran away.  Percy, who had drawn out Riptide as soon as he heard something snarling at him from the alleyway on his way home from school, was a little put out.  Oddly enough, this wasn’t even the first time this had happened.  

Last week there had been some cyclopses blocking the subway. Chiron had Iris Messaged him to take care of them on the way to his part time job at a Stop & Shop.  He’d broken in, wandered around underground for a while, trying to shake off the feeling of claustrophobia that he tended to get underground nowadays. Percy had come across the nest of cyclops’ near the stop he took to get home from the library.  There wasn’t much space to hide in a subway, so they’d heard him coming for at least a minute, but as soon as he came into the light of their bonfire, they’d started yelling.  

They dropped the unfortunate saytr who had wandered into their path and high-tailed it out of there.  One had started crying.  Percy had almost felt bad.

Even the saytr he tried to help stand had acted weird.  He’d been shaking so badly that Percy had given him his hoodie.  As soon as the saytr had gotten a good look at Percy’s face, he fainted.  

Percy carrying an unconscious, half-goat man out of a subway without attracting attention from any of its inhabitants or pedestrians was neither easy, nor fun.

When the saytr had come to, he hadn’t ben able to stop shaking Percy’s hands and thanking him.  He’d even had Percy sign his forehead.  Then he’d left with Percy’s hoodie still on his back.  

Weird, right?

There had been a similar situation with some harpies earlier.  Before that had been the thing with the manticore.  For some reason, monsters just didn’t seem to want to attack Percy anymore.  He couldn’t figure it out.  He should have been public enemy number one, especially since he’d had a hand in putting Gaea back to sleep last summer.

Shaking it off as yet another strange occurrence in his increasingly bizarre life, Percy headed  home.  

“Hey Percy,” called his stepdad, Paul Blowfis, as Percy walked through the door.  “Anything interesting happen at school today?”  One of the weird things about having a teacher for a stepdad was that he had the same vacation time as Percy.  (Except that Paul was actually getting to enjoy his).

“Nope,” said Percy, kicking off his vans and dropping his backpack outside the door.  He tended not to count monsters as important occurrences anymore.  They were way too common and they tended to stress out his parents more than anything else.  Besides, this one had just run away.  Like the last twelve had.  It was so bizarre.  He’d have to ask Annabeth about it tonight when he Iris Messaged her.  

Later Percy’s door opened as he was doing homework (more like pretending to do homework while really he abused his YouTube privileges on the laptop he had gotten for Christmas.  It was blue.)

His mom poked her head through the door.  “I just got back from the store.  Paul’s making spaghetti tonight.  Do you want to come help me cut vegetables?” She asked.  Lately Sally Jackson, née Blowfis, had been coming up with excuses to spend time with Percy.  He knew why she was doing it.  There’d always be a chance each day might be his last (at least, a greater chance than most mortals), but he was going to be a senior in high school come September.  Her little boy was growing up.  

“I’ll be right out,” Percy said.  He could never say no to his mom.  “Just let me finish this.”  He held up his assignment, took another glance at it, then hopped out of his seat.  “On second thought, I’ll come help you right now.”

Sally smiled, and the lines around her eyes became more pronounced.  Percy was just glad that she had so many reasons to smile now that she was married to Paul and the world wasn’t currently ending.  “Okay, but don’t use Riptide to cut anymore cucumbers, Percy Jackson.  I mean it!”

“Oh come on, that was one time!” he said, following her out of the room.

“We had to get a new kitchen table!”  Paul chimed in from the kitchen.

“That was the hellhound’s fault, not mine!”  

 

* * *

 

If Rachel’s eyebrows got any higher, they’d be in Olympus.  “So you’re saying that you want me to find a magical artifact- that may or may not exist- that can not only bring the camps even closer together, but also protect them.  What does that even mean?  The camps are already unified. They fought together in a war last summer.  And the artifact has to be something that only a child of Hades would be able to get?”

“And that Nico could give to Percy as a birthday present, yes.”  Annabeth added from where she sat on the end of Rachel’s bed in the Big House attic. “As for the unification of the camps thing... I don’t know, it sounded good in my head.  Maybe it would be a way to travel between the two more quickly or something?” 

The room had been cleared out and all the old junk and remnants of quests had been stored somewhere else to make room for Rachel’s art supplies and various other personal items.

The oracle had her hair tied back in a bandana.  She was smearing charcoal across her sketchpad and sitting against the headboard of her bed.  Every now and then she looked up to scrutinize Annabeth and tell her to keep still.  “How would I even go about that?  You know way more about Greek history than me, even with all the crash course history lessons and visions I get.”

“Do you get visions of the past?”  Annabeth asked, distracted from the matter at hand.  

“Only when it pertains to something happening in the present or the future,” Rachel said, scratching her cheek and inadvertently rubbing charcoal under her eye.  Annabeth wondered if having what amounted to a TV set to a channel of nonstop Greek tragedies in your head was a good thing for a person’s mental health.

“Do you think you could... I don’t know, try and channel it?  Like tuning a radio frequency?” Annabeth clarified.  “Or maybe just look for anything you can see about me and Nico going on a quest?”

“Why do you care so much about Nico?” asked Rachel, in manner that suggested she was trying too hard to be casual.

“Hazel asked me to look out for him.  He’s a good kid... he just needs help.”  Annabeth answered lamely.  “Look, I can’t really explain it, okay?  He saved our lives last summer and to top it off, he’s terrified about how he feels for-”  she cut off abruptly.  Rachel wasn’t looking at her, but she was grinning at the sketch pad in her lap as she traced something on the paper.  She glanced up.

“Terrified about how he feels for...” she prompted, smirking.

“I think you already know.”  said Annabeth, adding Rachel to her list of people who knew too much about everything.  “Being the Oracle of Delphi, I imagine not a lot slips by you.”  They regarded each other critically.  

Rachel was the first to break eye contact, returning to her drawing with a smirk.  “That’s only somewhat true.  I only see the important stuff.  And I don’t get to choose what I see.”

“And yet somehow you know everyone’s secrets.”  Annabeth stated dryly, but she was grinning too.  

“Well, people like to come to the Oracle for advice with their problems, now that she isn’t a dried up corpse... Oh shut up, I’m younger than you,” Rachel said, sticking her tongue out at Annabeth, who had raised her eyebrows when she talked about the former oracle.

“Okay, so you’re a veritable wealth of information,” said Annabeth, prompting, “are you sure you haven’t seen anything about me and Nico?”

“Oh, I’ve seen many things about you and Nico.  And Percy.  Too many things, in fact.  Way more than I wanted to even.”  Rachel announced, making broad sweeps with her tiny piece of charcoal.

“And...?” Annabeth asked.  “Well, what did you see?”

“Sorry, can’t tell you yet.  Spoilers.”  Rachel said cheerily, like she didn’t know Annabeth’s fate, or, apparently, the fate of her boyfriend and Nico.  

Annabeth was only somewhat relieved that Rachel was able to joke about it.  When things were truly serious, the redhead usually told them the important parts.  “At least I’m guessing we aren’t a part of another new prophecy, right?”

“Not at the moment, no.”  Rachel said airily.  She put down the charcoal and picked up her eraser.  “If it’s any consolation, I do know you’ll go on that quest.  I don’t know who the third member of your group will be though.”

“How do you know we’ll go on the quest?” asked Annabeth.  She heaved a sigh and flopped down on the bed, making the springs creak.  Her hair fanned out around her like a halo.

“Because no one could stop you if they wanted to.”  said Rachel.  She dropped the eraser and held the sketch pad up to examine it critically.  “Hmm...” she muttered, “That’s interesting...”

“What?” asked Annabeth, sitting up.

Rachel rotated the picture.  Then she held it upside down.  She kept tilting her head from side to side.  “I thought I was doing a portrait but...”

“What?” asked Annabeth again, impatiently.

“Well... I figured out what you’ll be searching for on your quest.”  She held the drawing out for Annabeth.  She took it, her eyes scanning the scene rendered in charcoal, taking in the amazing detail.

“Oh.” She said.

“Yeah,” said Rachel. 

On the page, Annabeth recognized herself holding the drakon bone blade she had gotten in Tartarus.  Her profile faced Nico, who was holding his stygian iron sword.  The contrast between the two of them was the difference between night and day.  Rachel had drawn Annabeth with soft grays and highlights, while the shadows around Nico were exaggerated and solid black.  Even their weapons were complete contrasts of each other.  They stood side to side in the foreground.  Behind them lay the object of their quest.

“Oh.” said Annabeth again. Then: “How would that unify the camps?”

“Beats me,” said Rachel, scratching her head as she looked at the picture over Annabeth’s shoulder.  “I don’t interpret the visions, I just... draw them.  Apparently.”

“Well on one hand you’ll never have artist’s block.” said Annabeth, smirking.  

Rachel regarded her with raised eyebrows.  Annabeth mirrored her expression until Rachel’s face exploded into a grin.  “Do you wanna see if I can draw anything from the future again?”

“Hell yeah.  What am I gonna eat for breakfast tomorrow?”

They spent the rest of the morning experimenting with Rachel’s new ability.  Rachel started a new sketch book and went through page after page while Annabeth made occasional suggestions like: “Will Grover propose to Juniper this summer?” (yes, judging by the beautiful ring etched out in charcoal) and “Is Leo gonna set his cabin on fire again?” (no, he was going to set the Apollo cabin on fire this time).

“Hold up,” said Rachel, at the second question.  “Isn’t the Hephaestus cabin fireproof?”

“Yes.  What’s your point?” asked Annabeth

Rachel’s eyebrows furrowed together in confusion.  “Then how did Leo set it on fire in the first place?”

“You don’t want to know.” said Annabeth gravely.

 

* * *

 

Annabeth went straight to the Hades cabin after she exited the Big House with Rachel around lunch time.  In her hand was the tightly curled charcoal rendering of her and Nico on their quest. 

She knocked on the black door.  Most people avoided this cabin because it gave off creepy vides.  That, plus the unwelcoming decor, ensured Nico would be left alone- which was probably what he’d wanted.  The chill seemed to reach up from within the cabin and twist around her wrist.  She shook it off, lips twisting into a mild frown.  If Nico thought creepy parlor tricks would keep her away, he would be sorely mistaken.  She had faced worse than that before she turned eight.

She knocked again.  “Go away!” a voice shouted from within the cabin.

“No!” Annabeth yelled back cheerily.  Nothing seemed to irritate Nico more than cheeriness.  Absently she wondered why she was teasing him like this when the door was yanked open.  

Annabeth blinked rapidly, fighting desperately to keep her jaw from dropping.  Nico stood in the doorway in flannel pajama bottoms and a black t-shirt.  His hair was even messier than usual and he was rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.  He was still a couple inches shorter than her and Annabeth fought the urge to ruffle his bed-head because that amount of cute was excruciatingly out of place on Nico.  She wondered if he knew that he looked like a little punk teddy bear.

“Look.” she said, holding Rachel’s prophetic drawing in his face.  “See?  I need you.”

“Wha-?” Nico was obviously still half asleep despite the fact that it was almost time for lunch.  “That’s just a picture-”

“Nope!”  Annabeth corrected, marching past him into his cabin.  “Rachel can draw the future.” she said as she scanned the pigsty of a room, leaving out the fact that Rachel had only acquired this ability today.  “I already talked to Chiron.  We’re leaving in a couple hours.” 

 Well, she’d only sort of run by it with Chiron on her way to Nico’s cabin.  He’d seemed somewhat enthusiastic though when she’d told him that it would be her and Nico, though: “You’ll be a good influence on the poor boy.”  Chiron had said, looking pensive.  “He needs a responsible friend to help him grow.  This might be just the opportunity to get him to let you under his guard.  I have to ask though-” he said, examining Rachel’s drawing, “I don’t know why you’d chose this particular artifact.”

“Me neither, but it’s gotta be useful, otherwise Rachel never would have seen it.”  Annabeth had reasoned.  “Either way, everyone wins, right?  Nico gets friends and the camps get another magical item before it can be used against us by monsters.  Or worse.”

She located a duffle bag under the unmade bed in the corner of the room and proceed to stuff the nearest clothing items in haphazardly.  She sniffed a t-shirt and her lip curled in disgust.  “When’s the last time you did laundry?” she asked Nico, who was standing in the doorway with an expression on his face like Mr. D had shown up covered in pudding and singing about dwarves. (Which was an incident everyone had sworn never to talk about again but still thanked her and Percy for every Labor Day).

Nico seemed to shake himself out of his daze.  “What the hell are you doing?”  He yelled, stalking towards her.

Annabeth stepped gracefully out of his reach, the duffle bag still in her hands.  “We have a quest,” she said, handing him the paper that had been torn out of Rachel’s sketchbook.  “See?  That’s you.”  she said, pointing at the darkest thing on the page as he held it up to squint angrily at it in the light that streamed through the only window in the cabin.  “And that’s me.” Annabeth pointed at herself over Nico’s shoulder before bending down to pick up some discarded boxers and gingerly depositing them in the bag.  

“What’s that?” Nico asked reluctantly, curiosity getting the better of him.

“That is what we’re going on the quest for,” said Annabeth as she tried to force the zipper of the duffle bag closed.  “The shield of Achilles.  He used it during the Trojan war to defeat Hector.  Each layer of the images depicted in the shield is said to be a representation of the world.  Here,” she said, pointing to the outermost ring of the shield in Rachel’s drawing, “That’s the ‘great stream of Ocean’ described by Homer in the _Iliad_.  Next is the layer of dancing people, then the sheep farm and the herd of cattle, and so on until the Earth, Sky, and Sea, with the sun and moon and constellations in the center.”

“Why do you want to find this again?” asked Nico, tracing the edge of the charcoal shield with his pointer finger.  

“For Percy’s birthday present, remember?”  said Annabeth, moving back from Nico.  “Rachel said it would be useful in the long run for protecting Camp Half Blood _and_ Camp Jupiter.”  Okay, that was only sort of true, but Nico didn’t need to know that.

“And why do you need me?” asked Nico, repeating what he had said the night before.  

“You’re in the drawing!” said Annabeth in an exasperated manner.  There was way too much effort involved in getting Nico to do anything.  She wondered if it would be easier if she were Percy, but the son of Hades had never really listened to Percy all that much either.  _What was it with children of the Big Three and being so infuriatingly stubborn?_ Annabeth thought with some appreciation for the irony.  _Pot, meet Kettle._ She thought she’d found a match for her stubbornness when she’d met Percy, but this was ridiculous.

“Look, it’s entirely possible we’ll have to do some communing with ghosts to find this thing, since Odysseus is the last known person to have had it.  Now take this bag to the Big House and do some laundry or so help me I’ll drag you up there myself.”  Nico was looking increasingly alarmed.  He’d never been shouted at by Annabeth before and he was starting to understand why Percy usually did whatever she said.  She was scary when she got bossy.  

“Fine” he took the bag, grumbling, but he sped out the door when Annabeth raised her eyebrows.  “We’re leaving after dinner!” called Annabeth as he exited the cabin.

Once she was alone she glanced around the room, swinging her arms and humming.  It was actually pretty barren without all the dirty clothes covering the floor.  There were no personal touches to any of the walls and there was a fine layer of dust covering most flat surfaces.  It was obvious that Nico didn’t really think of the cabin as his home anymore than he did the Underworld.  Poor kid.

She smirked to herself as she exited the cabin to see Nico struggling to carry his giant duffle bag full of laundry up the hill to the Big House.  Turns out all it took was some shouting and mild threats.  He was just like Percy in that respect.  

Happy that she was at least learning how to deal with Nico, Annabeth headed towards the dining pavilion for lunch.  Finally she was able to turn her mind to the matter that Percy had brought up in his Iris message earlier that morning.  For some reason, monsters were no longer attacking her boyfriend.  How weird.  She wondered what that was about.


	3. Annabeth Does Not Have Cooties and Nico is Not Part of the Tour

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annabeth and Nico bond over oversized canaries and pancakes. Percy frets a little bit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope my lack of knowledge about Grand Central Station and Chicago isn't too obvious.
> 
> This won't be updated until I finally get to read the last book. I started it right after House of Hades, so some things aren't fully canon compliant. Sorry this isn't a real update.

Last night Percy had dreamt about Annabeth, which was actually a pleasant surprise, since normally he had dreams about the end of the world.  Lately he’d been dealing with dreams of Tartarus though, so Annabeth’s smiling face was an extremely nice change of scenery.

 He was wondering whether this dream was going to turn out like any of his other, non-apocalyptic dreams of Annabeth did, when she spoke.  But it wasn’t to him.   

“We have a quest.” she said. Hmm, that wasn’t what she usually said in his dreams.  Something moved in Percy’s peripheral vision and he whirled around and came face to top-of-head with Nico di Angelo.   

“Wha-Nico?”  This was new.  Something was telling him this wasn’t the kind of dream he hoped it was.  Percy took in his surroundings.  He was standing in between Annabeth and Nico in what looked like the Hades Cabin.  There was little natural light and there was dust everywhere.  It was really gloomy.  He backed up and watched Annabeth shove a piece of paper at Nico and then start picking up clothes and shoving them in a sack. 

“That’s you,” she said, pointing to the paper.  “and that’s me.”  _Wait, what?_   Why was Annabeth giving Nico pictures of themselves?  And why was she cleaning Nico’s room for him?  She never cleaned Percy’s room.  He was a little hurt actually.  Why were they going on a quest together?  He didn’t even know that Nico and Annabeth were that close.  This was so bizarre.  

 He watched Annabeth describe Achilles’ shield.  Nico looked both confused and angry.  “Why do you want to find this again?” he asked.

 Annabeth opened her mouth to answer, but the dream changed abruptly “For Percy’s-”

 “Oh come on!” yelled Percy as he found himself on a city street.  Around him were old brick buildings.  He saw a sign that pointed him in the direction of something called a Freedom Trail.  Annabeth and Nico were still there, but now they were fighting a giant monster with three heads.  One was a lion, the other a goat; a chimera, he realized, remembering the monster he had fought at the top of the St. Louis Arch.  The goat head of the chimera was wearing a Red Sox hat with two holes in it for its horns. 

 Percy watched as the third head, a snake, lunged towards Nico, but was cut off by Annabeth’s drakon bone blade.  “Thanks,” he said shakily.  Then: “duck!” he yelled as the chimera attacked again.  Percy reached towards his pocket even though he knew he wouldn’t be able to do anything in his dream.  He could only hope that Annabeth and Nico were still okay as he watched them duck and roll around the poisonous monster.  The street was dark, and the only light came from the street lamps.  

 Suddenly, the chimera clawed out, nearly catching Annabeth and ripping her to shreds.  “Watch out!”  Called Percy and Nico at the same time, before Percy sat up in his bed with a jolt.  

 His heart was racing.  He reached out blindly and found Riptide on his bedside table.  He uncapped it and let the soft light from the celestial bronze calm him a little. The alarm clock glowing bright blue said that it was only 4:12 in the morning.

 So Annabeth was going on a quest with Nico.  And apparently they were gonna run into trouble.  Percy wanted to hop out of bed and drive to Camp Half-Blood right then and there, but the rational part of his brain that sounded like his girlfriend made an appearance:  _Calm down.  They’re probably fine.  They’re two experienced fighters who know how to handle themselves.  Annabeth’s a genius and Nico can summon an army of ghosts.  This isn’t even in the top ten of monsters they’ve fought,_ he tried to assure himself.  It only somewhat worked.  Percy drifted off into an uneasy sleep.

 The next day he was agitated and even more distracted in class than usual.  His teachers all looked at him with concern.  The excuse Paul and Sally had given for his nearly six month absence had been a persistent and deathly contagious bout of Mono.  As a result, teachers and students tended to avoid him like the plague- even more than they had at the beginning of the year, that is.  (Although a side effect of saving the world was popularity, the mortals he had saved were not, unfortunately, aware of this.  Or the fact that he had even saved the world at all.)  His english teacher even asked if he was having a relapse of the disease, although Percy was actually feeling full of energy and ready to pounce on anything that so much as looked like it had crawled it’s way out of Tartarus.  These things were far more common in a high school than one might think, and most of them weren’t even monsters.

Percy spent each class on the edge of his seat, though his mind was hundreds of miles away, with Annabeth and Nico.  He wondered why it was so important for the two of them to go on this quest.  And why wasn’t Annabeth waiting for him?  They always went on quests together, even the unauthorized ones.  

What had she meant by “ _For Percy’s-”_   His what?  How was he tied into this?  He had way too many questions, and no way of answering them.  Percy had tried to Iris Message Annabeth in the morning, but he hadn’t been able to say her name to the mist he was making spray out of his kitchen sink because his mom had rushed him out the door, shouting about him being late. 

At lunch he hurried into the men’s room, but there was a group of guys smoking, so he wasn’t able to Iris message her.  He grabbed a water bottle from the cafeteria and stepped out behind the school, figuring he would be able to call her in a place where no students ever went.  He rounded the corner quickly and almost didn’t see the teachers sneaking cigarettes next to the dumpster.

“Shit!” he said, whirling back around the corner and pressing his back to the red brick wall.  That had been a close one.  He did not need to be in trouble with the faculty again. This was the first school he’d ever stayed in for more than three years and he’d be damned if he got expelled for something as stupid as being somewhere he didn’t belong.  With his luck they’d probably think he was trying to skip.  Or set the school on fire.  Again.

 He heard the bell signifying that lunch was over and cursed in Greek.  Now he wouldn’t be able to call Annabeth until he got home.  It was times like this that Percy really wished he had a cell phone, damn the consequences.

 Several excruciating hours later, Percy was sitting on the edge of his bathtub.  He threw a drachma into the mist and called out Annabeth’s name.  She appeared, sitting on a train.  Next to her, surprise, surprise, was Nico, starring moodily out the window.

 “Percy?” Annabeth blinked.  “What’s up?  You didn’t message me this morning.”  She glanced around to see if any of the other passengers had noticed that a boy had basically appeared in thin air.  None of them seemed to be aware of the fact that something was happening, so she chalked it up to the mist affecting the... other mist.  Huh.  The mortals probably saw her Skyping or something.

 Nico glanced up, noticed Percy starring at him through the mist, and promptly excused himself.  “Where are you going?” asked Annabeth.  

 Nico made a face.  “Why do you care?” he asked. Percy watched the darkly clothed demigod make his way past Annabeth until he was no longer visible in the aisle.

 Annabeth made a face that mimicked Nico’s moody pout.  “Very mature.” she said, turning back to Percy, who was still distractedly watching the aisle.  “So what’s up, Seaweed Brain?” she asked.

“Umm...” Percy’s attention returned to his girlfriend. “I had a dream last night.  About you and Nico.”  He scratched the back of his head awkwardly, trying to remember the details.  “Something about a quest?  For me?”   

Annabeth slapped her hand to her forehead in the universal term of _“what is my life?”_ Of course her boyfriend would be having prophetic dreams about a quest he wasn’t even on.  She considered telling him about her plan to help Nico, but reconsidered when she remembered that she was supposed to bring back Achilles’ shield for Percy’s birthday.  Or Nico was at least.  She couldn’t spoil that for him, it would be a really dick thing to do, telling her boyfriend what he was going to get for his birthday.  Although... she had all but told Percy what she was going to give him. She _had_ whispered certain things in his ear the last time they had been together with out communicating via Iris message.  She would hold on to his facial expression from that day until she was dead.  She was absolutely sure of it.

“Yeah, me and Nico are going on a quest to retrieve something for Chiron. You don’t need to worry about it.” she said, then winced, knowing that would do nothing to alleviate his confusion.  In fact, it would probably only make him more curious.

She was right.  Percy leaned towards the screen of mist.  “But there’s more.  I saw you and Nico!  You were fighting a chimera!”

“Hmm... I’ll keep that in mind.” said Annabeth.  Out of the corner of her eye she saw Nico returning from some other part of the train.  Percy opened his mouth to ask more questions.  “Gotta go Percy!  Talk later, love you!”  She swiped her hand through the mist.

Percy sat back as the connection was cut.  Annabeth was definitely hiding something.  He wondered if she was in danger.  And if so, was Nico in danger too, or was he the cause of the danger?  They were both acting weirdly, like they were avoiding him.  

Suddenly, Percy remembered something from his dream.  “Hey Mom?” he called to the other room.  “Where’s the Freedom Trail?”

 

* * *

 

Annabeth felt bad for hanging up on Percy, but she didn’t really want him prying about her quest.  It was supposed to be a “birthday present” after all.  

She wondered if she should be worried about the fact that she and Nico would probably encounter a chimera at some point.  She decided to worry about it later- Percy had defeated that particular monster when they were twelve.  The fact that they would come across some monsters was inevitable:  Nico was a child of one of the Big Three, and Annabeth was no weakling herself.  No, knowing which monsters they were going to have to fight was definitely an advantage. 

Nico sat down next to her, scowling.  That expression had been on his face since they’d left Camp Half-Blood.  As soon as they’d stepped outside the boundaries of the camp, Nico had raised a couple ghosts with some of their rations and proceeded to converse with them while Annabeth watched with interest.  She used to be kind of creeped out by Nico’s powers of raising the dead, but she’d gotten over it pretty quickly last summer.  Unfortunately, Nico still seemed pretty creeped out himself around her. He’d summoned the ghosts about fifteen feet away so she couldn’t hear their raspy whispers as they told him where they had to go on their quest.

Before that, Annabeth had tracked Mr. D down to the rec room of the Big House and had him approve the expedition.  When she’d told Mr. D about their quest he’d said it was impossible: “Achilles’ Shield had been lost for millennia.  Only the dead know where it is now.”  So Annabeth had mutely pointed to the corner of the room where Nico stood sulking in the shadows and Mr. D had grumbled and signed off on the quest.  

“I don’t know why you’d want it anyways.” he said, “There’s only been one person to hold it who didn’t die a tragic death.”

“Odysseus.  I know.”  Annabeth said.  She knew the history:  Achilles had been given the armor by Hephaestus during the Trojan War.  He leant it to Patroclus, who was killed in battle.  After Achilles died, Odysseus and Ajax had fought for the armor.  Odysseus had won and Ajax had killed himself to preserve his legacy of being undefeated.  Odysseus had brought the shield back with him on what became his famous twenty year journey.  But somewhere along the line the shield had been lost.

Argus had given Annabeth and Nico a ride into Manhattan before the sun had set.  Annabeth had asked Nico why they didn’t just shadow travel to wherever they needed to go.  Nico’s expression had gone sour and he’d told her that “he didn’t want to so drop it already.”  Annabeth took the hint, but she considered him curiously out of the corner of her eye as the van wound through city traffic.  Nico di Angelo was certainly a confusing puzzle.  

They got out of the van at Grand Central Station.  Annabeth admired the architecture while Nico handed some drachmas to a cyclops working a ticket booth.  Nico hadn’t told Annabeth where exactly they were going until he handed her the Amtrak ticket.  

“Chicago?  Why?”

Nico looked harried.  His eyes flitted from side to side as if he was afraid of being attacked by each early morning passerby.  “That’s just where the ghosts told me to go, okay?  They didn’t know where the shield was.  They said that we had to find the ghost of Achilles’ lover.  He would know it’s location.  Probably.”

Annabeth contemplated the new information.  “Why couldn’t you just summon his lover here?  And what do you mean, ‘Probably?”

“It doesn’t always work that way,” said Nico defensively, ignoring her second question.  “Some ghosts can only be summoned in certain places.  There’s probably some sort of gateway to the Underworld there.  Like a shrine or something.”

Annabeth suppressed a shiver at the thought of doorways between the Underworld and their world.  Vacationing in Tartarus and riding the elevator of death tends to have that affect on people.  “How will we find this shrine?”

“I’ll feel it when we get close,” snapped Nico. 

Annabeth raised her hands in the universal gesture for “calm the hell down” and the two boarded the train in awkward silence. Percy had Iris Messaged her as soon as they had cleared the city, which only served to create more tension between the two.  Annabeth considered the irony of her quest.  She knew who Achilles’ lover had been.  She wondered if Nico did, and if not, how would he react once he found out?

There’s a time for subtly and a time for ripping off the bandaid.  Annabeth was really bored with putting things delicately.  “Do you know who Achilles’ lover was?”

Nico, who had been staring out the window and succeeding fairly well in looking like a broody, miserable teenager, was startled by Annabeth’s abrupt questioning.  “What?”

“I said,” Annabeth put it slowly, like she was explaining calculus to Percy, “Do you know who Achilles’ was canoodling with before he bit it?”

Nico looked even more confused.  “Canoeing?  Like the boat?” 

Annabeth rolled her eyes.  “Canoodling.  It means dating, or something like that.  It sounded better than saying boinging or bonking or fucking, certainly.”

She decided then and there that subtly was probably not as overrated as some claimed it was.  Nico’s face became splotchy with color and he turned his whole body away from her to stare out the window again.  

“Ah,” she began again, thinking _What the hell is wrong with me?  Why did I say those things?_   She knew the answer:  she had wanted to shock him, to see how far she could push him.  Annabeth reminded herself that Nico could leave any time he wanted to if she pushed to far.  The boy could travel through shadows- a moving train couldn’t trap him.  “Ah- sorry.  That wasn’t very nice of me.  What I meant was-”

“I know what you meant!”  Nico interrupted hastily.  “I got it.  Just- stop talking.”  He still hadn’t turned around.  Annabeth could see that the tips of his ears were still red. 

Smooth, Annabeth. Real smooth.  Get the kid to open up to you by mortifying him by talking about sex.  What’s the worst that could happen?  It’s not like he was raised in the 1930’s or anything.  As far as eras go, it wasn’t exactly the most liberal with things like sex.  Or homosexuality, for that matter.

Annabeth tried to think of another way to bring up the subject of Achilles’ lover, since she really was curious if Nico knew what she did.  If so, he might have some insight as a child of Hades on where this particular door to the Underworld might be.  The faster they found it, the better.  Otherwise... well if their quest so far had been any indication, she was not looking forward to traversing all over Chicago with the son of Hades- especially since he seemed to hate her more than he pretended to hate Percy.  (Understandable, since she was kind of his number one enemy in that regard.)  

Eventually she gave up and opened a book.  Annabeth contemplated the last time she’d had free time on a quest and came to the realization that the answer was never.  It was hard to focus though.  She felt the familiar buzzing of adrenaline that she got on every quest, like a compressed coil of wire that’s about to spring out.  Every now and then she glanced at the boy next to her.  After several hours of stony silence he seemed to have fallen asleep with his cheek pressed up against the glass.  

Annabeth finished her book an hour or two later and sat in silence.  She wished she still had Daedalus’  laptop.  Several hours on a train in complete silence was not good for a kid with ADHD, let alone a demigod daughter of Athena.  What she wouldn’t give for wifi.

Idly she wondered how Percy was doing.  He wasn’t being attacked by monsters anymore for some reason, but she knew he’d have preferred monster attacks to summer school.  Annabeth couldn’t wait until they were both back at Camp Half Blood, sparring in the amphitheater, competing for the best time on the rock wall, celebrating his birthday...

Annabeth hadn’t realized she’d almost fallen asleep until something crashed into the train.  Her head was knocked to the side and she banged it on the side of their compartment.  Cursing she looked out the window, but it was almost midnight and she couldn’t see anything.  Quickly she flicked off the lights in their train compartment.  The outside suddenly became clearer without the reflection of the fluorescent lights in the window.

Annabeth peered into the darkness.  Beside her, Nico was rubbing his own head and swearing.  Both looked up sharply at the sound of banging from the roof.  

“What is it?”  asked Nico.  He had drawn his sword.  Annabeth drew her own bone blade.  She shushed Nico with a gesture and listened carefully, ears straining, to hear the monster in the dark.  He pushed her, to get Annabeth’s attention, then pointed mutely to the black silhouette of feathers in the upper corner of the window.  The only reason they were visible was because they blocked out some of the stars in the clear midnight sky.  Above her she heard a sort of pinging noise, like claws on metal.  But there was another sound, a clomping noise that reminded her of...

“Get away from the window!”  yelled Annabeth, as the monster pushed off the roof, leaving a dent.  It careened toward the glass on the side of the train.  Annabeth and Nico only had time to see the silhouette with wings spread wide before they dove to the ground.  The monster hit the glass head first and bounced off, leaving a spiral of slowly expanding cracks in the window.  Annabeth grabbed her and Nico’s backpacks, shoving them roughly onto the shoulders of their respective owners.  Then she grabbed Nico by the arm and pushed him outside their compartment on the train just as the monster head butted the train again.  Annabeth had just shut the compartment door when the window exploded in a shattering of glass. 

“What the fu-” Nico began, but Annabeth yanked him roughly by the arm down the narrow train corridor.  Her mind was racing.

“Did you get a good look at that thing?” she asked over the pounding of their footsteps.  Other passengers were starting to peak out of their compartments.  Nico pushed her hand off his arm but continued to follow her down the corridor. “I’m pretty sure it was a Hippalectryon,” said Annabeth.  “I saw the front half of a horse when it collided with the window, but the back half is a rooster.  I’ve never seen one of them up close before.”

The train shook again.  The monster bust out of their sealed compartment.  It’s front half and huge rooster wings reminded Annabeth of a Pegasus, only under the light she could see that it was actually bright yellow, like a canary.  She heard Nico mutter “you’ve got to be kidding me” under his breath as the Hippalectryon chased them through the train.  

The back half of the monster, from what Annabeth could see every time she glanced over her shoulder to gauge the distance between the them, was a huge plume of feathers and rooster feet.  The monster staggered awkwardly down the corridor.  It seemed to be having difficulty walking considering it had two very different sets of legs.  It swayed from side to side as the hooves and the claws moved at different speeds.   The passengers that had been poking their heads out earlier had all disappeared, shutting the doors of their compartments tight.  Annabeth wondered what they were seeing through the tiny windows in each door.

“We’ve got to get that thing off the train.” said Annabeth.  “We cant fight it from here.  Too narrow.”  Just then they reached a door.  The demigods burst into what looked like a dinning car.  There were tables bolted to the floor and a cart of silverware in the corner.  They stopped and looked at each other.  Annabeth shrugged and Nico rolled his eyes.  They turned back the way they had come and face the door.  Both raised their weapons.  There was a moment of eery silence.

The Hippalectryon exploded through the door head first.  Annabeth and Nico each dove to a different side as the monster charged through.  Although the dinning car was wider, there wasn’t enough room for it to turn around quickly.  It’s wings kept getting caught in between the tables.  Annabeth took the opportunity to get close while it was still trapped.  She slashed at a wing, ducked under, and tried to get at the monster’s throat.  It reared up with its powerful front legs though, and Annabeth had to fall back.  Nico had attacked the monster from behind.  She couldn’t see him but she heard him being swatted by the beast’s canary yellow wings. 

 “Where’s Percy when you need him?” she asked wryly.  Her boyfriend would have had much better luck with the half horse monster than they were having.

Nico said something through a mouthful of feathers that Annabeth couldn’t quite make out.  She ducked back under the table and came up on it’s other side.  She saw that Nico had somehow managed to jump on the Hippalectryon’s back.  He was having trouble holding on as it surged its wings and kept trying to leap into the air.  Annabeth had an idea.

She knocked over the table so the monster could get airborne.  Annabeth yelled for Nico to duck as the thing shot straight up and promptly hit it’s head on the roof of the dinning car.  Then, while the monster was still dazed, she rolled into position underneath the horse hooves and the rooster claws.  Crouching, she thrust up with her drakon bone blade.  The monster exploded into dust.  Annabeth’s blade was cast aside as Nico, without an overgrown canary to ride, fell through thin air and crashed into her.  

The two lay on the ground of the dinning car, dazed by the sudden collision.  Eventually Nico realized that he was on top of Annabeth. His legs were on either side of hers, and his hands were pinning her biceps to the ground.  He let out a strangled yelp and pushed himself away like she had a disease.  Annabeth rolled her eyes at his melodramatics.  

“We should probably get off this train,” she said “unless you want to explain what just happened to the conductor.”  She pushed herself off the floor, shaking the remaining gold dust out of her hair.  Was it just her or was the dust more bright yellow than gold?

Nico glanced back at the door that was swinging on it’s hinges.  Any minute now they would have to answer some questions from some very angry people.  “Fine,”  Nico huffed, hauling his backpack up on his shoulder.

He put his hand on Annabeth’s shoulder with an expression on his face like he was touching something disgusting.  Annabeth didn’t have time to be offended though as the shadows moved and they were suddenly standing in a city alleyway and not in a destroyed dinner car. 

“Where are we?” she asked, looking around.  A stray cat shot out from underneath a dumpster.  Nico looked at her like she was an idiot.  “Chicago.  Duh.”

“I thought you didn’t want to shadow travel.” noted Annabeth as the two made their way out of the alley and onto the city street.  It might have been the light pollution, but the sky was already beginning to welcome the day.

Nico walked with his hands shoved into the pockets of his old aviator coat.  He stared at his feet as the walked.  “I didn’t.”  He said bitterly.  “But I also didn’t exactly have much of a choice, did I?”

Annabeth didn’t really have anything to say to that.  The two demigods walked aimlessly.  Annabeth had never been to Chicago before, and she compared the buildings and skyscrapers to the ones in Manhattan.  Eventually their stomachs started rumbling, so she and Nico found a small dinner.

“Are you getting any...um... vibes?”  Annabeth asked Nico as she poured syrup on her stack of pancakes.  

Nico chewed on some bacon thoughtfully.  He seemed to have calmed down a little after the incident in the dinner car.  “Not really... there’s a lot of death here.”

Annabeth raised her eyebrows at his vagueness.  “And that means what exactly?”

Nico swallowed and started coughing.  Annabeth handed him a glass of orange juice, which he took somewhat sheepishly.  He cleared his throat and started talking again.  “It means exactly what I said.  People die all the time.  There’s a lot of people in cities.  There’s a lot of death here.  It’s gonna be hard to locate the shrine without searching for it a little.”

“So basically, we’ll just have to walk around the city until your radar pings.”  said Annabeth, laying some human cash down on the table.

“Um... yeah.  Sure.”  said Nico as he followed her out of the dinner.  The first thing Annabeth wanted to do was go to a library.  Nico had looked at her like she was crazy when she brought it up.  Annabeth had pointed out that Chicago was a huge city and a computer would be useful for finding out where to go.  They walked through the streets that were filing up with people going to work.  By then it was already almost nine o’clock in the morning.

“You can’t just google ‘Shrine to raise ancient Greek ghosts’ though.” pointed out Nico.  They were in the Lincoln Belmont Public Library.  Annabeth was sitting in a chair in front of an outdated PC while Nico stood behind her.  Every now and then he would turn in a full circle, glaring at other library patrons until they looked away..  

Annabeth rolled her eyes.  “Of course not.  But look at this.” she said, pointing to the computer screen.

“Chicago Haunted City Bus Tour,” read Nico.  “Really?” he scowled.  “You think this is how we’re going to find Achilles’ lover?  It’s a tourist trap.”

“Probably,” conceded Annabeth.  “But it’s better than walking around the city on foot.  Even if the stops aren’t the real deal, we’ll get around the city much faster and you’ll probably be able to sense the shrine if we get close enough.”

Nico had nothing to say to that, so they bought there tickets online.  Annabeth used the PIN number from Mr. D’s credit card to pay for it.  Nico looked both impressed and disturbed when she mentioned it.  “How did you-”

“It’s a long story.” said Annabeth.  Dionysus had Grover and I buy some balloons for.. uh... reasons.  Anyways I just memorized the numbers before giving it back to him.  He definitely owed me for the balloon incident.”

Nico looked a little disturbed at that.  They took a taxi to the meeting spot for the Haunted Bus Tour and got on with all several different families of tourists in white sneakers and kaki shorts.  They were the first ones on the bus so they sat in the last row.  

A small child ran up to Nico and asked if he was a ghost haunting the bus.  Annabeth stifled her laughter through her fingers as Nico glared at her out of the corner of his eyes.  “Uh.. no?” he said.  

“Jeffrey, come back here!” called the little boy’s mother from the front of the bus.  “Shut up.” said Nico to Annabeth, who was still giggling.

Nico gasped then.  Annabeth soon saw why.  The tour guide didn’t so much walk onto the bus as he did float.  

“Hello there.” he rasped.  “My name is Tiresias.”  Annabeth recognized the name of the blind prophet of Thebes with a jolt.  He was the ghost Odysseus had spoken to in the Odyssey, who had told him which way he had to go.  The tourists all murmured about the “impressive costume” of the tour guide.  Annabeth nudged Nico.  “We should talk to him.  He’s an oracle.  He’ll definitely know where we should go.”

Nico nodded curtly as the bus started.  Tiresias began narrating the history of Chicago in his ghostly whisper.  When they came to the first stop Annabeth and Nico waited until all the tourists had left the bus. Tiresias hung back too  At first Annabeth thought he was just waiting for them to depart, but as they moved up the isles, the ghost spoke.

“Annabeth Chase and Nico di Angelo.” he said.  Annabeth suppressed a shiver.  “I will lead you to the ghost you are trying to find, but he will not help you in the way you expect.”

“What do you mean?” asked Annabeth.  Tiresias turned and looked Annabeth in the eyes.  She wondered if the blind ghost could see her in some other way.

“The lover of Achilles will not tell you anything you do not already know, Annabeth Chase.” rasped the prophet, before he turned to Nico. “But Patroclus will help you Nico di Angelo, in ways you do not understand.  Take your seats.  We will arrive there shortly.” said the ghost, drifting back to the front of the bus as the tourists returned.  Annabeth saw that Nico’s fists were clenched.  She nudged him with her elbow and he glanced up at her sharply.  

 _Are you okay?_ she mouthed silently.  He shook his head, as if to clear it.  “I hate oracles,” said Nico.  “They’re never clear.”

“In defense of our friend Rachel,” said Annabeth, a smile beginning to form on her face, “I’m pretty sure they can’t help it.”

The bus started moving again, winding it’s way through traffic.  “Who’s Patroclus?”  Nico asked suddenly.

Annabeth started.  She wondered if it was too late to tell Nico the truth.  Would it be better for him to be surprised?  “Umm... you’ll see.” said Annabeth vaguely.  _This is going to get very interesting,_ she thought.


End file.
